Guilt
by we built sandcastles
Summary: AU, future-fic. At seventeen, Daniel Schuester is arrested for the murder of a classmate, causing his father, Will, to reflect on his son's life, their relationship and his own marriage. This is a dark fic and reader discretion is advised. Constructive feedback is welcome and greatly appreciated.


_October 19__th__, 2031_

The final day of the trial was uneventful. A normal, chilly fall day in Ohio. Clouds shrouded the sky. Stray cats outside yapped. Schoolchildren laughed as they walked to William McKinley Performing Arts High School, full of youthful energy. All except two students. One was expected to spend every waking minute behind bars. The other would never experience a waking minute again.

Will Schuester spent his morning staring at his home office ceiling, contemplating what the rest of his day, or the rest of his year would be like. He ran his hands through his greying hair, aged from years of stress from high school administration, his declining marriage, and his troubled son's behaviour. He'd cashed in on his personal days; he hadn't slept, eaten properly, or spoken to his wife in months, and for weeks up until the end of the trial, he'd contemplated jumping from the roof of his apartment, only stopped by the slim, delusional chance that Daniel might avoid jail time. Lawyers' bills, psychological evaluations, school report cards and copies of court statements were piled haphazardly on his desk. Things such as _aggravated murder_, _grievous bodily harm, _and _conduct disorder, possible antisocial personality disorder_ jumped out at him. He didn't know why he needed to keep them there other than masochism and the need to find a loophole, just one magical loophole to keep Daniel out of prison and out of trouble. He knew it was hopeless, but part of him wanted to believe that this was something Daniel could come back from.

"Will," a soft, Southern accented voice called. "You need breakfast."

Will looked up. His wife, Emma, stood at the door. She hardly ever went into the office anymore. Ever since the night the police came to the house, Will mostly stayed in the office, only leaving to shower or use the bathroom. He didn't even sleep in his own bed anymore; after all, what was the point when he couldn't sleep?

Ever since the police came, Emma thought about leaving Will every day. Every time the thought entered her mind, she pushed it away, but it always returned, lingering like a fungus. She felt she had to be there for Will, when she was dealing with her own emotions over Daniel's arrest. It was hard for her to remember ever being in love with Will, or Will being in love with her. She wasn't sure if Will had any real emotions anymore, aside from self-pity, self-loathing or guilt. She knew he must have felt those things, because they were all she could feel.

"Can you make me a coffee?" Will asked. "Please?"

Emma just sighed. "Coffee isn't a real breakfast," she said flatly. "I know you're feeling sorry for yourself, but you need to focus, and you can't focus if you don't eat breakfast."

"Fine," Will said, scowling. "Have you eaten yet?"

Emma nodded. "There's eggs and bacon in the frying pan and coffee in the coffee pot. You can make your own toast."

"We need to be there at ten," Will said, dumbly. "At the courthouse. They're expecting us there at ten."

"Okay," Emma answered, nodding. "Do you want me to iron you a shirt?"

Will shook his head, wondering when and how he became so bad at communicating with his wife. "I already ironed my clothes last night."

"Good," Emma said. "What do we do after the, you know, after the trial?"

Will shrugged. He hadn't thought about what would come after the trial. "I don't know," he answered. "We'll go away somewhere. I've still got more personal time saved up."

"So do I," Emma said. "I, um, I prayed for him."

_Him_, they always said. Never Dan, Daniel, Danny, always just _him_. It was as if his name were some horrible swear word. A reminder of Will's failure with a kid, a reminder of a time when kids looked up to him, admired him, kept in touch with him after they graduated. For a while, some of them still did, before he stopped taking their calls and responding to their well-wishes. He stopped being Will Schuester, award-winning show choir coach-turned-performing arts school principal and started being Will Schuester, fifty-five-year-old father to seventeen-year-old Daniel Finn Schuester, charged with the aggravated murder and grievous bodily harm of fifteen-year-old Emily Wright, straight A-student, cheerleader and principal dancer of the McKinley Ballet Ensemble with a bright future in the performing arts. He sometimes thought about the students he'd taught all those years ago, when he first started the school's show choir and all of their achievements. Emily could have been just like them, he thought, if she were alive.

Will didn't pray for Daniel. Praying, he thought, was pointless now. But it gave his wife comfort, so he just gave her a slight smile and a nod. He took his breakfast into his office and went back to not talking to Emma. In the back of his mind, he thought that she was going to march back into the office, ask for a divorce, walk out of their apartment and never look back. But she didn't. He knew she had every right to, but she hadn't, yet.

As he showered and dressed himself, he looked in the mirror at what he could only think of as a withered, worn out man. Greying and scrawny, with unkempt facial hair and bags under his eyes. He wondered what Emma thought of him. He didn't think of her as attractive anymore, but then again, he no longer felt any attraction to anyone or anything.

He heard three knocks on the door. "Are you ready?"

* * *

Even eighteen years later, Will could still remember where he was and what he was doing the day he found out one of his former students, Finn, had died at the age of nineteen. Finn had struggled with low self-esteem and poor grades for most of his high school years, but had been making an effort to better himself, go to college, have a career and make a good life for himself. Every now and then, just like with Emily, Will would imagine what Finn's life would be like if he were still alive. Last year, Will had celebrated Finn's birthday with some of Finn's old high school friends and teachers.

It was one of the worst days of his life, up there with his mother being diagnosed with cancer and finding out that his first wife Terri had lied about her pregnancy, hearing that such a young person with so much potential could be alive one day and gone the next. He never thought he'd hear something as terrible as "Finn's dead". It was so unexpected, something he never thought would happen, and yet it did.

He knew he should have seen this coming.

But he knew that the words, "Daniel Finn Schuester, for the crimes of grievous bodily harm and aggravated murder, I sentence you to life with possibility of parole after twenty-five years," would be permanently etched in his mind, like a tattoo or a constantly replaying horror movie. He'd never be able to forget the way Daniel looked in that courtroom; hair long and unkempt, a horrible goatee, his face demonic, with piercing, furious eyes.

Daniel was no longer a nice, good boy, but he wondered if Daniel had ever been good to begin with. He wondered where he went wrong, and whether he was to blame. Why Daniel had done what he had done, and how, after two and a half decades of being an educator and being married to an educator, his own son had turned out to be a cold-blooded murderer.

* * *

_A/N: Thank you for reading this story. I have never really written Will or Emma as central characters before but had this story in the back of my mind for a while and had drafted it a few times. _

_Please read and review. I will try and update soon._


End file.
